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Partner Update 18 October 2012
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- 2. Welcome and introduction SarahStewart, Chief Executive
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- 4. Agenda • Ian Thomas- Olympics 2012: Impact of being a host city. • Becky Madeley - Marketing and communications. • Carol Bell – Festivals and events. • Gill Pilkington – Business tourism. • Kathie Wilcox – Visitor information. • Sarah Stewart – North East England Tourism Awards 2012. • Round-table discussion. • „Meet the Team‟ and networking.
- 5. Olympics 2012: Impactsof being a host city Ian Thomas, Research Manager
- 8. Section Title –Arial Bold (32pt) Imagery area: 23.6cm wide x 10cm high or 3 images at 7.86cm wide x 10cm high
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- 16. Marketing and communications BeckyMadeley, Marketing Manager Imagery area: 23.6cm wide x 9cm high
- 17. National campaign • Three-yearcampaign. • Total campaign budget of £1m. • Continue to target our “Nesting Cosmo” audience within a 2-3 hour travel time. • Extending the campaign to cover London and Belfast. • Building on successful partnerships with East Coast trains and developing new plans in partnership with easyJet and First Transpennine Express.
- 18. Autumn / winter2012 • Kicked off 16 September, maximising opportunity of Great North Run coverage. • Themes include Christmas shopping, festive events and our New Year‟s Eve celebrations. • Partners include East Coast trains, Hotel Indigo, Metrocentre and Eldon Square. • Activity includes: national press insert (Sunday Times), online, radio, outdoor posters and PR.
- 19. Success to date Inthe first month of our campaign: • Web traffic significantly increased. • Over 2,000 competition entries to date. • Almost 3,000 new likes of our Facebook page. • Media visits secured from National Geographic Traveller Magazine, Scotland on Sunday, Independent on Sunday, Cycling Active and The Guardian.
- 20. Future planning • Springcampaign will run from February - June 2013. • Media spend of £200,000. • New creative design. • Still opportunities for partners to get involved.
- 21. Digital update We continueto invest in and develop our digital platforms. • App is now FREE and available for iPhone and Android handsets. • Website traffic continues to rise and 2012 looks like being a record year predicted to reach one million unique users. • Social media platforms: Facebook almost 8,000 likes; Twitter almost 4,500 followers. • There have been over 15,000 downloads of Discover Deals.
- 22. Festivals and events CarolBell, Head of Culture & Major Events
- 23. Friday 26 October– Sunday 4 November
- 24. Saturday 24 November– Monday 31 December
- 25. Enchanted Parks Wednesday5 – Sunday 9 December. Tickets on sale from Thursday 1 November.
- 26. New Year’s EveWinter Carnival Monday 31 December. Starts 5.15pm.
- 28. Business tourism Gill Pilkington,Conference Development Manager
- 29. Latest news • Goldaward win – „Best Brochure‟ at the Meetings Industry Marketing Awards (MIMA). • Our new, more flexible conference accommodation bookings system, GroupMAX, is almost ready. Training takes place in our offices on Wednesday 31 October.
- 30. Client dinner atSyon House, London Wednesday 26 September • London-based event organisers invited to dinner with The Duke and Duchess of Northumberland in their London home. • An opportunity for partners to make new contacts and strengthen relationships with current clients.
- 31. Familiarisation visit Thursday 15– Friday 16 November • Small group of event organisers from around the UK. • Demonstrating how NewcastleGateshead offers one of the best delegate experiences around. • „Extend your stay‟ programme to widen the range of partners involved.
- 32. International Confex week Tuesday19 – Thursday 21 March 2013 • Up to 12 partners can attend the show on the NewcastleGateshead stand. • NewcastleGateshead‟s Confex after- show party in central London. • Also suitable for other partners looking to entertain potential or current London-based clients.
- 33. The Meetings ShowUK • New for 2013. • Located in the centre of London at Olympia. • 1,500+ pre-qualified fully hosted buyers. • 3,000+ additional trade visitors. • 13,500+ pre-scheduled appointments. • 30m2 NewcastleGateshead stand – an opportunity for partners joining us at Confex to trial the show for FREE.
- 34. Conference Ambassadors’ dinner •Conference Ambassador Programme‟s 10th anniversary. • Dinner on stage in Hall One at The Sage Gateshead on Wednesday 24 October. • 10-year review publication.
- 35. Visitor information Kathie Wilcox,Head of Development Imagery area: 23.6cm wide x 9cm high
- 36. Our role Objective: to managean innovative and effective visitor information service across NewcastleGateshead to ensure all visitors (leisure and business) are welcomed and well informed.
- 37. Why is itimportant? • Well informed visitors spend more money in destinations. • Visitors want information at the right time, in the right place, and in the most appropriate way. • Visitor information across destinations should be connected and consistent - we can help link you in.
- 38. Information partners • Ongoingaudit. • High footfall areas, venues or attractions. • Destination literature, including maps and pocket guides. • Welcome to NewcastleGateshead training. • Digital solutions.
- 39. Visitor Information Centre •Shop „til you drop – visitors, locals, corporate gifts. • Set up accommodation booking deals. • Use the „knowledge‟. • Keep the team informed. • Know where they are!
- 40. North East EnglandTourism Awards 2012 Sarah Stewart, Chief Executive
- 41. North East EnglandTourism Awards 2012 Delivered by: In partnership with: Supported by:
- 42. The categories • Accessfor All Tourism. • Small Hotel. • Bed & Breakfast / Guest • Small Visitor Attraction. Accommodation. • Sustainable Tourism. • Business Tourism. • Taste of England. • Caravan Holiday Park / Holiday • Tourism Experience. Village. • Tourism Pub. • Large Hotel. • Visitor Information Provider. • Large Visitor Attraction. • Self Catering Holiday Provider.
- 43. Key dates • Friday2 November: deadline for applications. • November: short listing and judging. • January 2013: awards ceremony.
- 44. www.NorthEastTourismAwards.com • Follow uson Twitter @TourismAwardsNE • Do everything you can to promote, encourage and profile the awards. • Make suggestions for judges. • Apply and attend the awards ceremony.
- 45. Over to you... •What‟s been your business‟ greatest success so far in 2012? • How do you plan to develop that for 2013? • Are there any collaboration opportunities? • Which other businesses do you think would be worthy winners of a North East England Tourism Award 2012?
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Editor's Notes
- #5 First, some good news and a shiny trophy to show you collected by Tina at the recent MIMA event in London. We’re delighted to report that NewcastleGateshead’s Meetings and Events Guide won the gold award for ‘Best Brochure’. All our venue partners and service providers appear in the Guide which is published biennially and has become a key reference tool for event organisers everywhere.Those partners who provide us with accommodation allocations for conferences will be aware that our new booking system, GroupMAX, is almost ready. Training sessions take place at our offices on Wednesday 31 October so if you provide allocations to us and haven’t signed up yet, please do contact Anna Moroney, our operations manager, and get signed up today! We’re very excited about the new system which is user friendly, flexible and will provide improved service levels to event organisers and delegates alike.
- #7 Pre games training camps
- #9 Rumoured that one of the teams enjoyed the hospitality of the city so much they extended their stay and payed for their own travel home so they could stay longer
- #11 Book ending creating a reason to stay in the city
- #14 After glow of the games, NewcastleGateshead benefitting as played host to one of the first big events to follow
- #15 August for Ashes, date for European team games
- #18 NewcastleGateshead has been identified as one of 14 primary destinations as part of Visit England’s domestic tourism campaign.This campaign will run for the next three years and RGF match funds our existing national marketing budget giving us a total budget over the next 3 years of £1million We will use RGF to strengthen our existing campaign activity promoting NewcastleGateshead as a city break destination. We will continue to target our “Nesting Cosmo” audience, who is aged 25 – 35 with no children living within a 2-3 hour travel time of NewcastleGateshead.Our campaign activity to date already focuses on the North West, Yorkshire and Scotland, but with this additional funding, we are looking to extend the campaign to cover London and Belfast.For the past 2 year’s we’ve worked in partnership with east coast trains who has been the transport partner to our campaigns, and are also in conversation with easyjet and transpennine express to provide more targeted and relevant travel information to potential visitors living in the North West and Northern Ireland. We will be using the campaign to deliver benefits to our partners across Tyne and Wear, with a target of xxx additional full time jobs created in the next 3 years.
- #19 Our autumn campaign kicked off on Great North Run weekend, making the most of the positive media coverage of the destination. The campaign focuses on pre-christmas city breaks and themes include Christmas shopping, our Winter Festival programme and the New Year’s Eve celebrations and our partners for this campaign include east coast trains, hotel indigo, metrocentre and eldon square. There are copies of the latest insert on your tables, this will be in the Sunday Times this weekend. The campaign also includes online advertising, radio advertising and outdoor poster sites in our core target cities.We’ve also continued our contract with Paul Gogherty, a national PR consultant. He’s been tasked with securing national editorial coverage and long-lead magazines, and will be using similar themes to secure media visits and editorial coverage.
- #20 Since the campaign started last month, we’re already seeing positive responses Traffic to our website is significantly increased in our core target areas, with peaks during marketing campaign activtity.We’ve already had over 2,000 competition entries to win a luxury weekend city break and over 2,000 new facebook likes.We’ve also secured a number of national media visits in national magazines and newspapers. The national campaign work is also supported by our in-house PR team’s proactive work targeting regional media and coverage for our festivals and events programme. The campaign runs until the end of November and we will be conducting a full evaluation through Visit England. We’re working on our spring campaign plans now, and there will be a media spend of around £200,000. We’re also looking to refresh the campaign creative, to bring this inline with the place brand work.There are still opportunities for you to get involved – if you want to be a partner of our future campaigns just come and speak to me at the end of the presentations.
- #21 We’re working on our spring campaign plans now, and there will be a media spend of around £200,000. We’re also looking to refresh the campaign creative, to bring this inline with the place brand work.There are still opportunities for you to get involved – if you want to be a partner of our future campaigns just come and speak to me at the end of the presentations.
- #22 We continue to invest in and develop our digital platformsOur official city guide app is now FREE and available for iPhone and Android handsets. There are a number of advertising opportunities available for all budgets on our website and ecommsWebsite traffic continues to rise and 2012 looks like being a record year. We are now consistently seeing over 100,000 unique visitors to the website and June was a record month with over 127,000 unique visitors. There have been 13,224 voucher downloads of Discover Deals.Facebook now has over 7,500 likes and 4,323 twitter followers.
- #23 Good Morning EveryoneThis was one of my favourite images of the year, from the Bridges Festival NewcastleGateshead Initiative’s culture team organised to celebrate the Olympic Football,But we have been pretty busy the rest of the year supporting partners such as Nova International's with this years amazing Great North Run and Great North City Games as well as planning our own festivals and events for the rest of the year.So I am going to talk briefly about plans for the rest of the year and how you can get involved.Change slide
- #24 Coming up in little over a week is NewcastleGateshead Initiative’s Award winning Juice Festival for Children and young people27 projects and 17 venues and open air locations across NewcastleGateshead The programme covers early years to early adultMulti-art form – some elements of the programme build from previous years (eg Just Jam, Finale Parade), some are brand new (eg Little Universe, Dragon Steps)No single theme but some mini-themes – dragons and planetsMore open air work this year (Art Jam, Little Universe, Finale Parade)Some events already sold out (Sparkle, Art Jam), Juice underpinned by networked delivery model, so wide sense of ownership of projects across the city 20 cultural sector organisations, 7 schools and colleges, over 70 artists, 1 media, 3 corporateThere is a jam packed programme many of the events are free to take part in it’s a great programme for visitors and residents to take part inJuice Festival is quickly gaining national recognition as a leading festival of its kind
- #25 Our Winter Festival programme kicks off on the 24th of November with the Ouseburn Open Studios, were there will be a great opportunity for visitors and residents to get some great unique gifts for ChristmasThere are also lots of other things happening across NewcastleGateshead, the Sage Gateshead will have its first Food and Wine Fair, and its will be the St Mary’s Heritage Winter FairOur winter festival brochure which will be out in a couple of weeks will feature all the Christmas Show, Panto’s, Markets food offer and lots moreAs well as supporting and promoting an important time of year NewcastleGateshead Initiative is involved in the development and delivery of three key events this year.Next Slide
- #26 Enchanted Parks will run from Wednesday 5th of December to Sunday the 9thWith support from Gateshead Council and Arts Council England, this year we have commissioned eleven artists from the North East and the rest of the UK to create an amazing after dark trail through Saltwell Park.This will be the seventh year we have ran Enchanted Parks, and each year the demand for tickets grows and grow’s In 2012 we are expecting an audience of up to 15,000 over the five days the event takes placeTickets are £6 and free for under 16’s accompanied by an adultThey will go on sale on November 1stCheck our website for booking information next week
- #27 New Years Eve in 2012 resident and visitors get two opportunities throughout the day to celebrate the coming of 2013We will build on our 2011 early evening parade and fireworks working with community groups and artists from across the city.There will be performances on Northumberland street and around Monument in the afternoon and the carnival parade will begin around 5.15 / 5.30 starting at Monument and going up Northumberland street to end at the Civic Centre.Over the past three years the carnival parade has grown and grown, last year we attracted record numbers as you can see from the image behind me.More and more people are coming in early to see the event or choosing to stay on after the event to eat or drink in the bars and restaurants.So if you are business based in the city centre have a think about how you might want to get involved and talk to either myself or my colleague Maddie Maughan after the presentations.I am really pleased to announce that this year that Hi-Lights will be the technical sponsors of the Early Evening Carnival Parade and Fireworks event.
- #28 This year NewcastleGateshead will be celebrating in style not once but twice.For a number of years there has been desire to re-introduce a New Year’s Eve Midnight Firework. By cost sharing the production team across the early evening event the midnight fireworks display staff costs to rig the second display are kept to a minimum.Key viewing points for the midnight event are still to be finalised, we will promote the main viewing area to be along the Newcastle Quayside as well as some locations on the Gateshead quayside (depending on the final firework firing locations and fall out zone). For this event to be a success, NewcastleGateshead Initiative would work with the bars, restaurants and hotels along the quayside to promote their own activities happening within their venues. The public will be encouraged to go to these venues (such as The Sage Gateshead, Malmaison, the Waterline, Slug and Lettuce, Jury’s Pitcher and Piano, Ramada Encore etc) to celebrate New Year’s Eve with the added bonus of customers of these establishments being in prime position to view the firework display at midnight to complement the entertainment within the venues.
- #30 First, some good news and a shiny trophy to show you collected by Tina at the recent MIMA event in London. We’re delighted to report that NewcastleGateshead’s Meetings and Events Guide won the gold award for ‘Best Brochure’. All our venue partners and service providers appear in the Guide which is published biennially and has become a key reference tool for event organisers everywhere.Those partners who provide us with accommodation allocations for conferences will be aware that our new booking system, GroupMAX, is almost ready. Training sessions take place at our offices on Wednesday 31 October so if you provide allocations to us and haven’t signed up yet, please do contact Anna Moroney, our operations manager, and get signed up today! We’re very excited about the new system which is user friendly, flexible and will provide improved service levels to event organisers and delegates alike.
- #31 The first of our business tourism events for 2012/13 took place last month at Syon House, the beautiful London home of the Duke and Duchess of Northumberland. Despite flood-interrupted train journeys and a Metropolitan Police stop and search programme delaying the caterers’ delivery to the venue, our team, 10 of our partners, The Duke and Duchess and 75 guests all managed to get there on time and enjoyed a drinks reception and dinner together in the most glorious of settings. Follow-up activity is underway and as part of this we are aiming to bring some of the clients we met in London up to NewcastleGateshead to see the place for themselves in a Fam Visit next month.
- #32 The aim of the Fam – on 15 and 16 November - is to show event organisers and booking agents with keen interest in our destination how we can offer one of the best delegate experiences around.The visit will last just over 24 hours, finishing early on the Friday afternoon. We think this presents a fantastic opportunity for hotels and venues which also cater for leisure visitors to invite these event organisers to extend their stay and explore the area further with a friend or partner. As part of an “extend your stay programme” Partners are invited to submit offers such as complimentary accommodation, second night free accommodation or free spa treatments, food and drink, entry to an attraction or tickets to a show. We will collate the offers and encourage the visitors to extend their stay.Details of this opportunity were circulated earlier this week along with details of how up to eight partners can meet with the event organisers at the evening meal on the Thursday. Alex Mackee, our operations manager, will be available to have a chat with anyone interested in the familiarisation visit opportunities after today’s meeting.
- #33 Next on the agenda will be our attendance at Confex in March. Up to 12 partners can join the NewcastleGateshead stand and be part of the UK’s biggest MICE industry trade show which attracts around 8,000 national and international conference and event organisers.This year, we’ll also be hosting our very own Confex after-show party in central London on the Wednesday night of the show. We’ve already started work on plans for a night of North East hospitality and entertainment that will attract event organisers with an interest in NewcastleGateshead. The party will also provide an opportunity for additional partner venues and support service providers to be part of Confex week.The nature of the event will mean that non-business-tourism partners can get involved as well. So, if you have clients, or prospective clients, in London and would like to invite them to a special North East showcase event that you don’t have to organise, then here’s your chance... Watch this space (and your inboxes) for further details as we have them!
- #34 Finally, just a quick mention of the Meetings Show UK in July next year. This is a first for us but, with the inclusion of a fully hosted buyer programme, the show is being well supported by venues and destinations across the UK. Sign up for Confex and come with us to trial this new show for free.Full details of theConfex and Meetings Show UK partner opportunity will be circulated within the next week or so and Shelley Johnson, our marketing manager, is here today if you want to find out more.
- #35 And last, but not least, this year we’re proud to be celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Conference Ambassador Programme, the scheme whereby we work with academics, clinicians and other professionals in the region to bid for then host conferences in NewcastleGateshead. We have almost 1000 participants in the Programme, individuals who are hugely important in helping us attract the all important association market. So, we thought they deserved a party and where better than on the stage of Hall One at The Sage Gateshead. There will be 60 of us and it’s never been done before for such a group and we are all very excited and immensely grateful to the team at The Sage Gateshead for working with us on this.A special anniversary Ambassador newsletter will be published at the end of the year and you will all receive a copy so you can read about some of the Programme’s activity.That’s it from me, I shall hand over now to Kathie Wilcox to give you an update on the many changes in our Visitor Information services.
- #37 From April of this year we took on management responsibility for the visitor information service on behalf of both Gateshead and Newcastle City Council. As part of that we oversee the management of the Visitor information Centre as well as havingresponsibility for the future development of the service to ensure that it’s fit for purpose and really delivering what visitors want and need in a destination. So our objective in summary is: to manage an innovative and effective visitor information service across NewcastleGateshead to ensure all visitors (both leisure and business) are welcomed and well informed.
- #38 So why is visitor information important and what’s all of this got to do with you as venues, attractions and businesses here...Well, it’s very sensible to ensure visitors are as well informed as they can be because: It encourages them to visit in the first place Their itineraries are enriched and they visit more places / attractions while they’re here This therefore increases their length of stay and their contribution to the local economy And means they are more likely to return.As most of you will know, tourism in NewcastleGateshead is worth £1.26bn and supports over 18,000 jobs – so it’s a really important industry for the area and the provision of timely, relevant visitor information - both before and during a trip here - is pretty key to the ongoing success of the destination. Some visitors are happy to seek out and go into a visitor information centre and others want the information at their fingertips – whether that’s digitally, or in their hotel room, or at the attraction they’re visiting...We’re really keen to join up this provision of visitor information and ensure that it is in the right place, at the right time and in the most appropriate format and we think our diverse range of partners, including yourselves, can play a role in helping us achieve a connected and consistent approach.
- #39 Over the last year we have made some strides in information provision including digital solutions such as the free iphoneaps, widgets that we can provide to help draw visitor information through to partners’ websites and improved inspirational content for visitors on our own website. But there is still more to do that will allow us to provide information in a smart, and effective way. We’ve begun our ‘information partners’ project with an audit of where we are as a destination. Prioritising high footfall areas, venues or attractions we’re trying to get a better picture of what information is out there at present and how we help these venues or information partners to take some simple steps to improve what’s available.This is a long term project. Initially we’re looking at what literature visitors can pick up, what staff knowledge or training is in place and what digital solutions exist or could be implemented to help visitors access information. We’re looking to ensure that every information partner has this consistent and effective baseline level of visitor information in place before we look at more ambitious next steps and if we’ve not already been in touch we’d be keen to talk to any of you about how you can support this project. Clairemarie at the Visitor Information Centre is leading this project alongside Paul our business development manager.Alongside this, the visitor information team have provided a fantastic ‘mobile’ service at major events, conferences and cruise arrivals. Again it’s all about having the information where people need it and great north runners and medical conference delegates come here for a specific purpose but nevertheless benefit from access to information about great places to eat and how to get around. The team have attended around 30 events to date this year and the response has been incredibly positive.
- #40 So if you imagine the information partners as the spokes on a wheel, the hub is the Visitor Information Centre which is right in the heart of Newcastle.Hands up if you know where NewcastleGateshead Visitor Information Centre or VIC is located?It’s actually on Market Street (just near the Q1 bus stop) and there’s also an entrance in from Central Arcade – and it’s the only Visitor information Centre in NewcastleGateshead now. (lots of people mistakenly think that the Guildhall centre is still in operation).The VIC has a fantastic shop – and the team are improving the range of merchandise all the time which includes everything from t-shirts and hoodies, cool and quirky gifts and souvenirs and locally made jewellery and produce. It’s definitely not your usual range of tourist tat and I’d encourage you all to pop in for a mooch. On a serious note, we really need you all to know about the shop so that you can recommend it to visitors, point friends and family in the right direction and also consider it for any corporate and uniquely Geordie gifts you might want to buy for your clients or colleagues.If you’re a quality assessed accommodation provider please chat to the team at the Centre about an accommodation booking deal. Some visitors still book on arrival and the team help to place their business in and around the city so they’re keen to be working closely with hotels and other accommodation providers.They talk about London cabbies having ‘the knowledge’ – well they’ve nothing on our visitor information team. If you ever need some insider knowledge on NewcastleGateshead for yourselves or a visitor or client, they would be more than happy to help. Every member of the NewcastleGateshead Initiative team has now spent a day in the Visitor Information Centre to better understand the customer facing, frontline experience of working in tourism. And without fail everyone has been incredibly impressed by the expertise of the VIC team – and their ability to help with any query, no matter how obscure!Please also think about keeping the team in the Centre updated with your openings and new developments. They’re talking to visitors day in day out and can only draw on the information they have available so please feel free to call them with updates, arrange delivery of relevant print or invite them to see your venue, attraction or business direct. NewcastleGateshead.com remains the key channel for online visitor information and events, which the team obviously use for reference. But if they’ve seen or experienced something first-hand it can only improve their ability to confidently represent you and your business. And last but not least please remember where they are – and share this with any customer facing colleagues. A huge amount of visitors who go into the centre complain about being sent to the wrong place or being told that a centre no longer exists! We’re working to improve this with new flyers that highlight what and where the VIC is (which we’ll be distributing to key public places around NG) and we’re looking at how we improve signage. We’ve also just produced some banners for the scaffolding which currently completely obscures the shop frontage while some essential works to the listed building takes place. Hopefully this will help remind people they’re there and open for business. We do really need your help though to get the word out about where the centre is and just what the team there can provide.That’s everything from me on Visitor Information but myself and two of the Visitor Info team – Margaret and Kate – will be available to chat and answer any questions at the end. Next up is Sarah who’s going to talk about the North East Tourism Awards....
- #42 The North East England Tourism Awards 2012 feeding into the National Visit England Awards for Excellence 2013 are being delivered by NGI in partnership with Northumberland County Council who have pledged resource to coordinate and facilitate the short listing & judging of 6 of the 14 categories. We then have various organisations supporting the awards, namely the bodies who make up the Northern Tourism Alliance; Northumberland Tourism, Visit County Durham, Hadrians Wall Heritage, The North East Hotels association and the local authorities in Tees Valley. Local event management company Evention is a new start up company who are offering their services completely free of charge to help with the event organising, providing management at the actual ceremony event and also facilitating some of the categories. These are the organisations making a regional awards possible.
- #43 14 categories in total New to 2014 is the Tourism Pub of the yearAnd they have removed rule that stopped Gold winners entering consecutive years What’s important is that entrants demonstrate their achievements and endeavours to improve and drive their business forward over the last year or two.
- #44 One the main features allowing us to deliver a regional awards is the recruitment of prominent, volunteer local judges. This was area of expense from One North East which we simply could not replace when they used to hire an out of region company to facilitate all applications, shortlisting and judging. What we have done is invited our many non tourism partners to volunteer to help judge the awards, giving their time freely. So far we’ve judges confirmed from NECCEntrepreneurs Forum Northumbria University Gateshead and Newcastle College’sAnd the BBC With more signing up each day! Highlight the NGI are not judging, we are neutral, simply facilitating. The judges are being selected because they are neutral and highly respected organisations. We know the application form is a long process – requiring a significant amount of time and effort. This is because we follow the VE guidlines and format. Judging is going to exciting and new this year – every short listed business will be given just 30 minutes to do wahtever they want to convince the judges why they deserve an award!!
- #45 What not to forget and what else can you do!! If anyone has any ideas of suggestions to make the awards more sustainable, easier to deliver, and better than ever please get in touch.
- #46 And last, but not least, this year we’re proud to be celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Conference Ambassador Programme, the scheme whereby we work with academics, clinicians and other professionals in the region to bid for then host conferences in NewcastleGateshead. We have almost 1000 participants in the Programme, individuals who are hugely important in helping us attract the all important association market. So, we thought they deserved a party and where better than on the stage of Hall One at The Sage Gateshead. There will be 60 of us and it’s never been done before for such a group and we are all very excited and immensely grateful to the team at The Sage Gateshead for working with us on this.A special anniversary Ambassador newsletter will be published at the end of the year and you will all receive a copy so you can read about some of the Programme’s activity.That’s it from me, I shall hand over now to Kathie Wilcox to give you an update on the many changes in our Visitor Information services.
- #47 Explain next steps